Thursday, October 6, 2011

PHILOSOPHY WEEK!!! rabbit hole

I hope we're all enjoying PHILOSOPHY WEEK!!! I know I'm not. Today we're going to talk about a movie we viewed about a month or two ago. And while we won't be discussing anything too philosophical, we are going to discuss why this movie should be insulting to normal people like you and me.

But mainly just you.

The movie, Rabbit Hole, was more than just a movie, more than Hollywood fatcats pretending they know what the average person's struggle is; it was an exercise in containing rage. It was watching your happily married mother pinch the pool-boy's ass.

It was coming home early from work to find your wife in bed with your step uncle.

It was your friend promising to trade you his Troy Aikman rookie card, then watching him sell it to a sketchy dealer at the local weekend card show.

Anyway, it's about a husband (the usually great Aaron Eckhart) and wife (the scraggly yet still hot Nicole Kidman) dealing with the loss of their (probably gay) four year old son. Little guy got hit by a car when he ran into the road, chasing the family dog.

It doesn't help that Kidman portrays the kind of wife you just want to - no, just have to beat, abuse, destroy, break, humiliate. OK sorry, a bit much there. Her depiction of a grieving wife is offensive - though not necessarily from the way she plays the part. What's offensive is that she has any idea about grief, what it is, how to deal with it.

Heckyeahwoman said she enjoyed the flick, not necessarily seeing it as a two hour bumout, the way I did. Instead, she saw it as an interesting portrayal of a family dealing with a very unfortunate incident, and the repercussions from the tragedy.

But the thing is, Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart are very rich. And true, I don't know them or what they went through before they became rich and famous. But for multimillionaire actresses and actors, I find it hard to believe they are as in touch with raw human emotions as the rest of us.

Maybe that's an indictment of my cynicism, but I firmly believe that living an insanely posh lifestyle, having more money than you'll ever need tends to provide a pretty nice cushion when life knocks you down, no matter how tragic the boot to the face.

And maybe that sounds horrible, I don't think money is everything. But I do believe that having a lot of it makes a lot of things a lot easier. Especially during emotionally trying times.

Dealing with the loss of a child is a lot easier, I'm sure, when you can take a couple months off, jet off to an exotic beach with family and friends and deal on your own terms. Of course that's opposed to getting a measly week of bereavement from your job at the factory, while not knowing if you'll be able to make ends meet this month - the way many normal people have to cope.

The elite simply have many more resources at their disposal - mostly courtesy of their financial means.

Please don't mistake that I have something against the wealthy; I don't. I do have something against someone that has no idea what middle class struggle is, pretending to know, and then expecting that same middle class pay to watch the whole fuckaroo.

On the plus side, the movie did have a couple saving graces, one being the interactions at the group therapy session. Also, there was one scene, probably my favorite, where the couple was fighting, and Aaron Eckhart just stops and blurts out "What do you want from me?!"

A couple things immediately popped into my head, as I simultaneously started chuckling to myself. But explaining to Heckyeahwoman that the chorus of the song below was the cause of my giggles didn't have the same effect on her.

The last redeeming quality of the movie, for me, was the ending. Kinda-spoiler alert: the kid already got run over, and this ain't a ghost story - so he ain't coming back. So without spoiling too much, I was happy with the way they resolved the movie.

You know, a part of me thought Rachel Getting Married was the worst movie ever. Then Desperation Road, and then initially this one. Shit, I just remembered Amelie. So many shitty movies, who cares.

Turns out I'm not really convinced this was the worst movie ever. In fact, I had originally just jotted down a couple notes immediately after viewing, with plans to write a post about it. But the more I write about it now, the more favorably I see it.

The story was admittedly pretty decent, and it's really hard to dislike Aaron Eckhart, no matter how spoiled he may or may not be. Plus, he smokes reefer with the Asian chick from Grey's Anatomy, in addition to some other slightly, unintentionally humorous scenes.

At the end of the day, yeah, I'm just some dude from Michigan that feels kind of insulted that Hollywood producers think they can stick a couple pretty faces into a movie with a relatively serious subject matter, and pretend to know me or people like me. That's fine. But what isn't fine is that more people don't share my sentiment.

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tall man on the loose in tampa area

True story, there is a tall man terrorizing the Tampa area. This weirdo usually hangs out around parks, trying to find pick-up games of basketball - during which, he will grab the ball and maneuver around so that you come into contact with his stinky, naughty bits.

Truly an unpleasant experience.

His signature move is the "bait and switch junk grab". As you're grabbing for the ball, his junk magically appears. In the way of your hand.

Another one of his famous moves is to let the ball go loose, then as you scramble for it, his sweaty ass gets in the way. Of your face.